


Don't Forget to Smile

by paperowl



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Attempted Murder, Canon-Typical Violence, FebuWhump2021, Gen, Mind Control, Mostly hurt, Psychological Trauma, Whump, and some recovery, it's quite the ride though, so buckle up, so wild I don't know what to tag it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-02
Updated: 2021-02-02
Packaged: 2021-03-13 06:28:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,340
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29148978
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paperowl/pseuds/paperowl
Summary: “What do you think you’re doing?” Steve snarled.“Oh, me?” the man said, breaking into a smile, “I’m having fun.”Peter didn’t think he’d ever been more terrified in his life. The manic glint in the man’s eye and the glee with which he approached the situation made Peter feel like just about anything could happen now, and none of it was going to be good.On a fine June afternoon, while Peter is helping some of the Avengers fight humans enhanced with Chitauri tech, a nameless man in a purple suit walks right into the middle of it. Unarmed except for his unsettling British accent and an air of confidence, he shouldn't be this powerful.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes & Peter Parker, Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Comments: 6
Kudos: 59





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I wasn't even going to touch Febuwhump, but then I realized I had a draft for a mind control fic just sitting half-finished. So I figured I'd join in on the fun for a bit. 
> 
> This fic is... yeah idk, it's something. I feel very evil posting it, so uh, enjoy?

Serving as recon and backup for a small Avengers mission wasn’t all Peter had thought it would be. He just sat a few stories up on a roof, watching Tony, Rhodey, and Steve fight the humans enhanced with Chitauri tech. Occasionally he could offer warnings or pointers to the others due to his vantage point, but overall it was pretty boring. Yeah, dodging fireballs was a bit invigorating, but even that novelty wore off pretty quickly after Peter had a near miss and almost ended up engulfed in flame.

So the last thing Peter expected to see on this thoroughly unexciting June afternoon was a man in a suit walk into the middle of a literal firefight. His suit was purple and the way he walked, practically dripping with confidence and authority, made Peter pause. Peter felt his spider-sense start to murmur in the back of his head, warning him of something, but Peter couldn’t tell what, just that something about this man was off.

Karen’s AI capabilities couldn’t ID the man, he was nameless, and apparently, didn’t exist. No one else appeared to notice him, or was too busy to do anything, so Peter climbed down from his perch and into an alley, still staying out of the way, but more able to do something should this man spell trouble.

“Hey, Mr. Stark? Can you ID that guy in the purple suit? Karen can’t find anything,” Peter asked over the comms, the tingle at the back of his head only growing as he watched the man get closer to the epicenter of the fight.

After a bit of a pause, which Peter guessed was due to Tony’s frankly impressive mid-air acrobatics show while trying to dodge fireballs, he responded, out of breath, “Huh, that’s odd, neither can FRIDAY. Just web him up if he causes any trouble. We can figure this out later. Right now I’m a little busy.”

Peter confirmed he’d heard Tony’s directions, and while watching for any hints this guy was bad news, Peter noticed something. None of the people on the ground got anywhere near him, and if they did, he’d say something and they would back off. It was… weird, especially given that otherwise they seemed positively rabid, going after anyone and anything with a ferocity that made them hard to subdue or distract. Peter really didn’t like it.

Then, the man stopped and turned to look in Rhodey’s direction with a horribly smug look on his face. All of a sudden a wave of anxiety hit Peter, he stumbled from the force of it and tripped over his words while trying to alert the others, “Guys, that guy in the purple suit is bad news, like really bad. Do something, NOW!” 

He hadn’t meant to shout, but he hadn’t felt this bad in a long time, there was something horrible about this guy that set off his spider-sense. As if on cue, the man yelled “STOP!”

And everyone stopped. The enhanced humans froze in place, and so did Steve. The man strode up to Steve and started talking to him, his voice quiet enough that even Peter couldn’t quite make out his words. Rhodey tried to fly closer to do something, but the man just pointed up at him and said “Freeze.” 

Rhodey froze in place, drifting down from where he was hovering until he landed on the ground.

“Hey uh, Mr. Stark?” Peter whispered, now afraid that somehow the man could hear him.

“Yeah?” Tony responded tightly, still hovering a distance away from the man.

“What do we do?” Peter asked, watching the man circle Steve slowly.

“I-” Tony said, interrupted when the man turned to face him and smiled devilishly. 

“Hey Iron Man,” he called, “I know you love being all high and mighty, but come on down here. Everything’s fine, I just have a favor I need from you.” Tony hesitated, and Peter willed him to resist that stupid, unsettling British accent. “Come on, this won’t take long.” The man beckoned and Tony followed his orders.

Peter stayed in the alley, his mind racing. He was the only one left who hadn’t been sucked into whatever trance this guy was putting on everyone. Working his hardest to try and formulate some kind of plan, he watched on in shock as the man decided all the Chitauri humans were in the way. With a few words, they turned on each other, viciously ripping into one another with wild abandon. Within moments they were all dead, or very close to it.

Peter gaped, unable to look away, it was horrifying. When the fighting ceased, the man turned back to Tony. Yet again, all it took was a few words and Tony was turning towards Steve, Steve picked up his shield and— oh no. Against his better judgment, Peter started running towards what looked to be the beginnings of a fight between Tony and Steve. The last one didn't go well, and this time they couldn't stop. Peter didn't want to think what would happen if he couldn't at least delay it.

He reached them just before they looked about ready to jump on top of each other. Peter decided at the last second to try and tackle Steve, because at least if he didn't do anything, hitting muscle was better than hitting titanium alloy.

The man noticed him as he was leaping at Steve, and the look on his face chilled Peter’s blood. Peter did his best to distract Steve and it worked for an abysmally short amount of time, for which the man watched with glee. When Peter got thrown off of Steve's back and onto the ground, the man held up his hands to both Tony and Steve. “Stop, stop stop,” the man said, so Peter did, and thankfully so did Tony and Steve.

The man walked over to where Peter was pushing himself up to a standing position. “Well what have we here?” the man purred, “Spider-Man?”

“Hey man,” Rhodey said, his faceplate flipped up and an edge of desperation to his voice, “I don’t know what you want, but—”

“Shut up,” the man said, “and nobody move!” 

Rhodey stopped talking, but he didn't look happy about it.

“Why don’t you take off your mask so we can see that pretty face of yours?” the man asked, turning back to Peter. “What is Tony Stark hiding?”

Behind Peter, Tony fired up the repulsor on his chest, pointing it at the man in the suit. The man just laughed and waved Tony away. 

"Come on, we don’t have all day here,” the man said to Peter, sounding a little impatient.

Peter didn’t want to. He was out in the open where anyone could see him, taking off his mask was an idiotic idea. But despite this, the man told him to, so Peter obeyed. The mask slipped off of Peter’s head and he looked down at it in his hand. That wasn’t right, he shouldn’t have taken his mask off.

“A child?” the man sounded surprised, “Tsk, tsk, Stark, getting irresponsible are we?” 

“What do you want?” Tony asked, shooting the man a death glare.

“Well, I _was_ going to make Captain America and Iron Man fight to the death. But the addition of him,” the man gestured at Peter, “makes things interesting.”

“ _What_ do you think you’re doing?” Steve snarled.

“Oh, me?” the man said, breaking into a smile, “I’m having fun.” 

Peter didn’t think he’d ever been more terrified in his life. The manic glint in the man’s eye and the glee with which he approached the situation made Peter feel like just about anything could happen now, and none of it was going to be good.

“Now, I could have a lot of fun with you, make you really scared, get you screaming. But,” the man looked down at his watch, “we’re running short on time, so this’ll do the job.” The man picked a gun up from the ground and held it out to Peter, “Take it.”

Peter hesitated, but grabbed the gun with shaking hands when the man said, “Now.”

“Peter,” Tony said, “put the gun down, please.”

“Oh dear,” the man said with a little pout, “it appears he can’t, isn’t that right?” he asked Peter.

Peter nodded, he couldn’t put down the gun.

“Wonderful,” the man said, “for this next bit I’m going to need you out of that suit, Stark. So come on now, get rid of that hunk of armor, you don’t need it.”

Tony nodded and disengaged from the suit, stepping out of the relative safety of the Iron Man suit and into a situation that could only get worse without any protection. Peter swallowed nervously, dreading the next words out of the man’s mouth.

“Now,” the man said to Peter, “I want you to shoot Iron Man.” He leaned closer to Peter with a smirk, “And try to aim for something vital, it’s much more fun when they die.”

Peter slowly raised the gun, still shaking, unable to stop himself. 

“Peter, Pete. You don’t have to do this.” Tony pleaded, “Please, kid, stop it right now.”

Steve and Rhodey’s faces mirrored Tony’s desperation, and the man laughed. “Go on,” he said to Peter, “you want to do it, don’t you?”

“I want to do it,” Peter said. The shaking in his hands stopped almost immediately and his fears melted away. Somewhere, some part of him knew this was wrong, but the man told him to, he wanted to. So Peter pulled the trigger.

What the man didn’t realize was that Peter was a horrible shot, so instead of hitting Tony in the chest, the bullet went through his shoulder. Tony still couldn’t move, so he had to stand there, wound in his shoulder bleeding without any way to stop it.

The man sighed dramatically, “Well, that’s disappointing, isn’t it?”

“Not particularly,” Tony snapped, pain evident in his voice.

“Mmm, I suppose not for you, but I’m rather bored. Tony dear, you can move now, your shoulder looks like it needs tending to,” the man said, watching as Tony fell to the ground and clutched his shoulder.

“Fucking bastard,” Tony hissed.

The man smiled. “And now the entertainment begins,” he said. He pointed at Steve and Rhodey, “You two have gone suspiciously quiet, I’d love to hear you try to stop your friend here.” The man patted Peter on the shoulder. That horrible glint in his eye, he stepped away and pointed at Tony, “Kill him.”

Peter lunged for Tony, who was still on the ground and clutching his shoulder. He could hear Steve and Rhodey yelling at him, telling him to stop and leave Tony alone, but the man said he had to kill Tony, so that’s what Peter was doing. Tony put up a better fight than Peter expected from someone with a bullet wound in their shoulder, and they rolled around on the ground, Peter punching and kicking, trying to get his hands around Tony's throat. Slowly but surely, Peter gained the upper hand, and it wasn’t long before Tony lost consciousness.

All of a sudden there were hands all over Peter, pulling him off of Tony before Tony died. There were people around him telling him to stop, but he couldn’t. Peter kicked and screamed, trying to get free and back to Tony. The man told him to kill Tony, he had to listen, he had to do what the man wanted. 

There was a sharp jab in his arm and the world went black.

* * *

Peter blinked, squinting at the bright lights above him. He tried to move his hand up to shield his eyes and when he couldn’t, he looked down and noticed the restraints. He was lying on a hospital bed, in what appeared to be a medical facility of some type. Peter couldn’t remember how he’d gotten there or why he was tied down. He could have been kidnapped for all he knew. He pulled at the cuffs as hard as he could, trying to get out of them. 

A door opened and closed. He looked over and Natasha was standing by the doorway watching him.

“Where’s Mr. Stark?” he asked. He had to kill Tony, he needed to.

“Not here,” Natasha answered, stepping over to a machine and pressing a button. The world went black again.

* * *

The next time Peter awoke he could think more clearly. He hadn’t been kidnapped, he was just in the med bay, and Tony… 

_Oh._ What had he done?

This time the person who came to check on him was Bucky. The door had barely swung shut when Peter sat up and started talking. “Is Mr. Stark okay? I swear I didn’t mean to do it. The man told me to and I just had to do it. He’s not dead, is he?”

“Stark’s not dead,” Bucky said gruffly.

“Is he okay?” Peter asked.

“He’ll heal,” Bucky said. “How are you feeling?”

“My head hurts,” Peter said, and wow, yeah, his head was throbbing.

“That’d be the drugs.” Bucky said, “Anything else?”

“Uh…, my um, May, does she know?” Peter asked, stumbling over his words.

Bucky nodded. “She knows it wasn’t your fault,”

Peter sighed and leaned back in the bed, “Okay, good.”

“I’ll grab some painkillers and food. You’re scheduled to stay here for another night and then we’ll reassess, okay?” Bucky said. 

Peter nodded, lost in thought. He couldn’t stop thinking of those moments on loop. How he’d lunged for Tony, how he hadn’t stopped, how he’d screamed and fought to get back to Tony because he wasn’t dead yet. He didn’t realize he’d started to shake and hyperventilate until Bucky was back next to him, undoing the cuffs and telling him that everything was fine.

“But everything’s not fine” Peter choked out, “I tried to _kill_ Mr. Stark.”

“But he’s not dead, and you don’t want to kill him anymore, right?” Bucky asked.

Peter nodded.

“Well that’s all you need to worry about right now, okay?” Bucky said. 

Peter nodded again.

Bucky coached him through a few deep breaths, patted him on the back, and then handed him some pills and a bottle of water. Peter gratefully gulped them down and tried to calm himself. He was fine and Tony wasn’t dead.

“I’ll come around in the morning, okay? If you need someone before then, press this button.” Bucky indicated a button on the wall near Peter’s bed. Then gave him a sad smile and stood up, exiting the room and leaving Peter on his own again.

* * *

True to his word, Bucky came back in the morning. After a fitful night of sleep, with nightmare after nightmare, Peter was glad to have someone else around. Bucky said he was being allowed to leave, as the general consensus seemed to be that whatever had happened to Peter was now worn off. Peter was fine with that decision until May walked into the room.

Peter saw her face and immediately all he could see was Tony on the ground, bleeding everywhere, and he was filled with panic. He scrambled off the bed and backed away from May until he hit a wall. “Please leave May, I don’t want to hurt you,” he pleaded. Every second she was in his presence was another second where he had the opportunity to snap and hurt her too. May continued to walk towards him and Peter slid down the wall, trying to sink through it and get away from her.

At the last moment, right before Peter felt like he was about to implode, Bucky walked in and convinced May to leave. She complied, but not without casting a few worried glances Peter’s way. The door clicked shut behind her and Bucky came to sit next to Peter. He didn’t say anything for a while, just waited for the tears to stop falling and for Peter to calm down.

“So?” Bucky prodded.

Peter shrugged, fiddling with his fingers. “I don’t know, I just feel like if I could do what I did to Tony, what’s stopping that from happening to other people? What if I just decide to kill them and can’t stop myself?” he sighed.

“Nothing will stop it,” Bucky said. “It’s a risk you have to learn to live with. Because if you don’t, well, life becomes a lot more miserable. Trust me, I know.”

“How do you live with it?” Peter asked, looking over at Bucky.

“If Steve was willing to die instead of fight me because—even when I was brainwashed—I was still his friend, then I should be willing to spend time with him, taking it on faith that the idiot values me more than his total safety or my full sanity,” Bucky smiled. “It’s not always smooth sailing, but it’s better than being sad and alone, I can tell ya that.”

“Can I see Mr. Stark before I leave?” Peter asked, chewing on his lip.

“I’ve heard he’s not quite up for visitors yet. Probably not today, kid,” Bucky said.

“Oh, okay,” Peter said, both disappointed and relieved at that information.

He and Bucky sat in silence for a while before Peter said, “I think I’m willing to try again. With May.”

“Okay,” Bucky said easily. Peter was grateful there was no pressure from him. No ‘are you sure?’ or anything.

The second time went much more smoothly, Bucky stayed in the room and Peter tamped down his fear enough to give May a hug. He decided then that he could go home, he was tired, and that was starting to outweigh just about everything else. Bucky offered him words of support and May smiled, Peter was just glad the worst was over. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, so I didn't mean to add another chapter, but the Febuwhump prompt for today worked, I kinda hated the original ending, and someone commented that they were glad it was a multi-chap, so to you, commenter, congrats! It's now _actually_ a multi-chap (with a better ending).
> 
> It's been a while since I saw Jessica Jones season 1 and I never watched season 2. So if you've seen it please forgive any inaccuracies, and if you haven't seen it, I did my best to keep spoilers to a minimum, but just know that Jessica is like, perpetually grumpy/angry and I couldn't get it to feel that way in this fic, but it's there in spirit. 
> 
> I deleted the last couple paragraphs of chapter one, so if you read that part before I posted this, you might want to check back and see where it left off (I swear this new ending is less depressing and rushed)

For Tony, the worst wasn’t over just yet. 

The man, whoever he was, had messed with Tony more than just trying to kill him. Tony couldn’t even think about Peter without flinching. He knew it wasn’t the kid’s fault, that he’d been in control just as much as Tony had, which is to say not at all. But still, Tony had been beaten half to death, and he couldn’t just pretend like that never happened. 

Peter liked him, admired him, and Tony felt like he was letting him down. Tony tried his hardest to get over the hump, tried to call Peter, just let him know he was okay. But he couldn’t. The phone would ring and Tony, again and again, would cancel the call, unable to stomach hearing Peter’s voice. Not when the last thing he’d heard Peter yelling was “I need to kill him, let me kill him!”

He hated himself for it, the kid deserved better. Peter didn’t deserve missed calls and half-written texts, Peter didn’t deserve a mentor who couldn’t get over his own fucking problems just to say hi. Pepper said it was trauma, Rhodey said it was trauma, his shrink said it was trauma. But it wasn’t trauma, it was Peter. And somehow, that was worse.

Tony decided that this whole mess was his fault. He’d invited Peter on the stupid mission, he hadn’t noticed the man was a problem until too late, he hadn’t told Peter that if he was all alone he should wait for backup and not jump into the fight. He himself was the reason he now couldn't stand Peter. All of this fell on him, not on the kid, and yet he still couldn’t shake the uneasy feeling that being around Peter was a bad idea.

He hadn’t spoken to Peter for weeks, he’d put the internship on hold indefinitely, and he ignored everyone who told him that was okay right now, that he needed to focus on himself first. Because it wasn’t, it was the farthest thing from okay. He couldn’t do this anymore, all the worrying, the blaming, and the fear he held for an innocent teenager. The nameless man in the purple suit deserved to die for that, for the way he messed with Tony's head and destroyed his relationship with Peter, and maybe if Tony killed him he could finally trust Peter again.

He was going to find that man, he had to. He had FRIDAY scanning cameras all over the city to find him, identifying people who interacted with him, forming a profile, and trying to create some kind of trail they could follow. Person after person after person turned into dead ends, all people who met him once and would sorely regret it. Then he discovered Jessica.

And that’s how Tony found himself in a run-down, shabby old apartment building trying to find a woman who seemed to have quite the past with the man in the purple suit. He walked down the hallway towards her apartment, doing his best not to touch anything, this place was rather disgusting. He did have to touch the door when he knocked, and he hoped that there wasn’t anything gross on it that he didn’t know about. When the door opened he heard the clinking of glass and realized the hole in her door that was covered by cardboard used to be a window, which didn’t bode well for the cleanliness of his hand.

A woman with dark hair stepped into view, “Yeah?” she said, glaring at him.

“I’m looking for Jessica Jones of Alias Investigations, is that you?” Tony knew it was her but with that glare, he figured the best tactic would be to act like he didn’t know too much about her.

“Obviously,” Jessica said, pointing at the words Alias Investigations written in marker on the cardboard in her door. She opened the door wider to let Tony in. “What do you want?” She asked, closing the door behind him and crossing her arms.

“I want to know about the man in the purple suit,” Tony said.

Jessica sighed and walked over to her desk, opening a drawer and pulling out a bottle of whiskey. She poured a liberal amount into a glass and took a large drink. “Did he have a stupid fucking british accent?” she finally asked, sitting down on her desk.

“Yeah,” Tony said, “with a side of mind control to top it off.”

Jessica took another drink of her whiskey and smiled, “I killed him.”

Tony decided he liked her.

* * *

The man’s name was Killgrave, and he was a sick son-of-a-bitch. Even the abridged version of what he’d done was horrific. Tony was starting to think he and Peter had gotten off pretty okay, all things considered. They were both alive, and they hadn’t been horribly tortured, or stuck with him for a year with no way out, or awaiting trial for murders they hadn’t wanted to commit.

According to Jessica, his powers only lasted, at maximum, twenty-four hours, and after that, if he wasn’t there to re-up the command you were free. He was also one hundred percent, totally dead. Jessica had made sure of it. For that, Tony was willing to offer her heaps of money and his assistance if she needed it. Jessica took some of the money, said maybe later, and kicked him out.

Tony spent the car ride back to the tower bouncing between being glad Killgrave was dead and being upset that he wasn’t the one to do it. Though Tony supposed that there was probably a line of people who’d be just as willing as he was to kill Killgrave if they had the chance. So without giving himself a moment to think about it, Tony texted Peter. He deserved to know Killgrave was dead.

After that, it took him two weeks to work up the courage to call Peter, and two more to build up to seeing his face. He felt horrible the whole time, because he should be doing more. Killgrave was dead, this wouldn’t happen again; it couldn’t happen again. There was no reason to worry about Peter anymore. And logically, he knew that, but in practice, it was much more difficult to come to terms with.

Finally, Tony figured it was time to try seeing each other in person. He invited Peter to a team dinner where they both knew that if anything went wrong they could be stopped. Tony hated himself for the panic attack he had right after he ended the call, but the deed was done, and no one had to know how terrified he was. 

The dinner was tense. He and Peter barely looked at each other, and every time Peter moved unexpectedly, Tony tensed. It wasn’t a disaster, but it wasn’t a success either. It was reassuring to hear later that Peter had been just as scared as Tony, worried that there was still something dormant that he wouldn’t be able to control. It meant they were on a more even playing field than Tony assumed, and weirdly, that helped a lot.

Gradually, the internship days came back, but they weren’t quite the same as before. There was always someone hanging around nearby just in case something happened, and both Tony and Peter were skittish around one another, especially when Peter was holding anything more dangerous than a pencil. But the internship days were back, and that counted for something.

Then, one day, no one was available as back-up and Peter was already on his way. Tony had a sneaking suspicion it had all been orchestrated and wasn’t at all accidental, but everyone denied it. Peter was more full of energy than usual, he’d gotten his SAT scores, and they were (unsurprisingly) good. So Tony didn’t tell Peter no one else was around as a safety net because he didn’t want to ruin the kid’s excitement. Tony just pretended like everything was fine. 

Soon that pretending melted away, and halfway through ordering food after he’d offered to let Peter stay later, he realized that everything really was fine. They were okay. He was okay. And Peter was about to burn himself on the soldering iron he’d forgotten about, because some things never changed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I hope this ending feels more natural and less sad. I'm crossing my fingers you enjoyed it, and if you did, I wouldn't mind a comment (after all, I'm a starving author who feeds off of positive feedback)

**Author's Note:**

> I hate Kilgrave with all of my being, but he's so, so fun to write. (If you, too, think he's rather infuriating and intriguing, Jessica Jones season 1 is on Netflix. Big trigger warning  
> for rape, abuse, and overall horribleness though, so be careful.)
> 
> Come visit me on tumblr @[paperowl](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/paperowl)


End file.
